The Gardiner estate is tantilisingly close to the proposed development of a university campus at Grangegorman, which will be almost two thirds of its size, and one wonders how these lost lands might have developed in the past if the proposed Royal Circus, planned to be located just a few minutes walk away, had been realised. As it transpired, Dublin’s greatest leap forward in urban terms faded before this could happen, and the north side of the city fell into decline.
